Yehoshua Perek 5

Perek 5 of Yehoshua tells us that the Bnei Yisrael performed bris milah (circumcision) en masse for the first time since they left Egypt. The Radak (5:2) writes that the people were perfectly justified for not performing bris milah in the wilderness – the conditions were too dangerous. Indeed, had they had been at fault we would have found a prophetic rebuke or Divine retribution of some sort which we do not find. Yet on first glance it seems that Rashi disagrees with the Radak, though as we shall see there is no disagreement whatsoever here.

At the start of Beha’alosecha Rashi comments that the Chumash does not begin with the command to offer the Pesach offering (despite its chronological precedence) “because it conveys the shortcomings of Bnei Yisrael - for the entire forty years that they were in the desert they only offered this solitary korban pesach (pesach offering).” This seems to go against the Radak, yet let us look deeper. What was the failure of Bnei Yisrael? Surely, the reason they did not offer the korban pesach in the wilderness was because many of them were uncircumcised (due to the non-conducive conditions for bris milah in the desert); they were thus not allowed to offer the korban pesach!

The Maharal in his Gur Aryeh commentary on Rashi lays down a vital principle in response. Whether Bnei Yisrael were at fault or not is irrelevant here. The fact that Bnei Yisrael did not have the merits which would have accrued if they had offered the korban pesach throughout the period in the desert is itself a shortcoming, even if they were not at fault whatsoever. A mitzvah builds us and develops our sensitivities; it carries with it great merits and tremendous closeness to Hashem. Therefore if we are unable to perform a mitzvah we should be saddened that we have missed a tremendous opportunity irrespective of whether we are at fault.

We tend to look at Judaism as full of obligations. We tend not to see mitzvos as ‘opportunities’ or ‘great merits’, but rather as ‘burdens’ or ‘unwanted responsibilities’. One consequence of such an outlook is that when we do not manage to perform a mitzvah, then as long as the reasons for us failing to perform the mitzvah are beyond our control we do not feel particularly bad about missing out on that mitzvah. This is an immature way of looking at mitzvos, for it focuses upon the fault aspect, as opposed to focusing on the objective value of a mitzvah. Similarly, the common culture of ‘looking for leniencies’ is an expression of not valuing what a mitzvah really does for you. If we really valued each mitzvah and understood what each one is and what it achieves, we would certainly be upset at missing out on a mitzvah, even if it was due to matters beyond our control. Certainly according to the Maharal’s inspiring idea, there is no dispute between Rashi and the Radak whatsoever; fault and lacking the opportunity of a mitzvah are two completely different concepts!